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Hungary Erects Anti-Refugee Barrier

A razor-wire barrier along Hungary’s border with non-EU member Serbia, aimed at keeping out migrants, has been completed, the Hungarian Defense Ministry said on Saturday.

“Two days before the August 31 deadline, the first section of the border closure has been completed,” the ministry said in a statement, France24 reported.

The barrier consisting of three rolls of razor wire along the 175-kilometer frontier is however failing to prevent people getting across, according to witness reports.

A four-meter-high fence is due to follow and is already being built by the Hungarian Army which will “also be a defense against illegal border-crossers,” the ministry said.

Around 1,000 border police currently control the border, and 2,000 more are due to be in operation from September 1, the government says.

Hungary, a member of the European Union and of the visa-free Schengen zone, has this year intercepted more than 140,000 migrants entering from Serbia. In the past week alone, some 10,000 crossed over as the surge reaches record levels.

2nd Austrian Migrant Vehicle

Austrian police said Saturday they intercepted another truck containing 26 migrants and that three young children had to be hospitalized, days after 71 people died in an abandoned vehicle.

“The three children had to be hospitalized ... because of the extremely bad state of their health. Doctors said they were treated for severe dehydration,” police said.

The vehicle, pulled over by police after a chase, contained 26 “illegal foreigners” from Syria, Bangladesh and Afghanistan who said they wanted to go to Germany, police said.

The incident happened in western Austria close to the border with Germany. The Romanian driver, who had refused to pull over for a routine check, was arrested.

On Thursday an abandoned truck containing the bodies of 71 dead migrants, including four children, was found on a motorway in eastern Austria.